


Kintsugi

by Crisplies



Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Ardyn Izunia Being An Asshole, BAMF Prompto Argentum, Body Horror, Demon Blood, Demon Prompto, Demons, Feral Behavior, Heavy Angst, Hurt Prompto Argentum, Loss of Limbs, M/M, MT Prompto Argentum, Mutual Pining, Panic Attacks, Poor Prompto Argentum, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Prompto Argentum Needs a Hug, Protective Noctis Lucis Caelum, Torture
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-09-28
Updated: 2020-12-11
Packaged: 2021-03-07 19:28:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 21,015
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26692969
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Crisplies/pseuds/Crisplies
Summary: It’s dark. It’s so dark and cold and he is so scared. Where is he? Who is he? He can’t remember… anything. There is only darkness and hunger and the need to consume the starscourge.Or... Prompto gets turned into a demon by Ardyn and his humanity is shattered. But even the most broken of things can come back stronger than before.
Relationships: Gladiolus Amicitia & Prompto Argentum & Noctis Lucis Caelum & Ignis Scientia, Prompto Argentum/Noctis Lucis Caelum
Comments: 34
Kudos: 217





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> So instead of continuing my other stories, I am now starting a new one so OOP sorry guys I suck lol ;-;

Prompto was afraid of the dark.

The constant foreboding fear had been a…  _ thing  _ ever since he could remember. Debilitating in its severity. 

More than once when he had stayed a little too late at Noct’s apartment, the sun just barely peeking over the Insomnian skyline, he would have to sheepishly ask his best friend if he could borrow a pair of pajamas and stay the night. The prince always seemed excited about Prom staying, but he still felt as if he were intruding no matter how many times Noct assured him. That dark hissing voice in the back of his head would loom and say he was overstaying his welcome, and he would get a gross slimy feeling in his stomach that would only go away when Noctis would pull him into bed and practically lay atop him and pretty much fall asleep instantly. 

On one memorable occasion, Prom thought he could make it back to his apartment before it truly got dark. It was only on the subway home that he realized he wouldn’t be able to make it. At first, he had tried to force himself through the dark streets, darting from street light to street light. But the terror had suffocated him and he ended up curled up at the base of a street lamp, trying to breathe through the panic. Hours later, his phone at 3%, Prom had mentioned to Noct that he still wasn’t home yet. Didn’t think that the prince would even really care. He was wrong. 

Truthfully he had just decided to stay under the light of the lamp until morning, it was summer and the night was pleasantly cool; he was wearing one of Gladio’s super comfy and large sweatshirts so he wasn’t cold. It definitely wouldn't be the first time he had fallen asleep on the street either. But Noct had  _ freaked!  _ Woke Ignis up and had the man drive all the way out to the fucking Caelyx (the area of the city named from the Old Wall statue of King Caelyx resided, which just so happened to also be the slums), which was forty-minute drive from the citadel. 

If Ignis was annoyed by being woken up at almost three in the morning just to drive Prompto five blocks down the street to his apartment he didn’t show it. Prom had never felt more like an idiot and had curled up against the door of the car and tried not to cry as the prince’s advisor came to a stop in front of his shitty apartment. The older man had even gotten out of the car and walked with Prompto up four flights of stairs (the elevator in the complex had been broken for months), and to his dirty, yellowed door. 

Ignis had bid him a goodnight and swiftly left. Prompto had curled up in his bed and cried. By the six, why was he a burden to  _ everyone? _

Thankfully, no one ever brought up that incident again. Not even Gladio, and Prompto knew he knew. Things did change, however. Whenever Prom would stay over at Noct’s there would be a little chocobo night light glowing comfortingly next to the bed. The bathroom and hallway light would be left on at night, a magic glowing crystal necklace as a birthday present, stuff like that. 

Prompto would be embarrassed if he wasn’t so relieved. 

And Prompto  _ was  _ embarrassed. Ashamed, would be a better word. He doesn’t know why Noct even wants to hang out with him, really. He was a coward, afraid of his own shadow. Claustrophobia, acrophobia, and an intense terror of doctors were just a few others in a long list of phobias that made his life miserable. He just wished he could be normal.  _ Normal  _ people didn’t have a panic attack every time they had to have a checkup at the doctors.  _ Normal  _ people didn’t feel as if their lungs were being crushed if they were shoved into a janitor’s closet. He was pathetic. A freak. 

But Noctis didn’t think so (at least he didn’t think he did). Noctis asked him to come along with him to his wedding to Lady Lunafreya (and oh hadn’t that been so bittersweet?). Helped him train to become a kingsguard. Would sling a careless arm over his shoulder (causing Prompto’s stomach to flutter warmly). He wouldn’t do any of that if he didn’t like him, right? 

_ Right _ ?

His thoughts were interrupted by a loud clang outside of his cell; heavy and horribly familiar footfalls echoing closer. Stomach dropping, Prompto strained against the metal cuffs that kept him suspended several feet off the ground, feet dangling. It was nothing but an animalistic reaction with no thought process behind it other than  _ get away.  _ He sways slightly in the air with his movement, the sturdy chains clinking softly with his weak struggles. The thick blood scabs on his wrist from the metal cuffs digging into his skin opened back up; fresh blood sliding down his arms, trailing the muscle concave of his armpit, along the lines of his chest and finally coming to a stop to a stop at his stomach. 

He is strung up, shirtless and prone. Dried blood caked the side of his face, dark bruises and deep cuts littering his body. The entire expanse of his back is a bloody flayed mess, with burning whiplashes, the deep welts of fire curl and cross across his shoulders and down the small of his back. Underneath his current wounds lay a labyrinth of metallic sheening scars, reflecting softly in the dim light of the cell. The silver gleam was from his wounds being healed by the various magic potions and phoenix down Ardyn used to keep him alive. 

Coughing wetly, grimacing at the copper taste at the back of his mouth, Prompto lets his head hang between his shoulders. Dark smudges shadow the underside of his bloodshot eyes (Ardyn doesn’t let him sleep for more than fifteen minutes at a time thanks to the sporadic shots of electricity that are sent through the chains holding him aloft). He doesn’t think he has ever been so exhausted in his life. He supposes that is sort of the point. 

His body is starting to shut down, he can feel it. Ardyn hasn’t given him any food since he came here. The only time he has been given water is when he was being waterboarded. The magic potions continuously being used on him were beginning to eat away at his body. Phoenix seared through his body, burning the inside of his arteries and nerve endings. The potions decimated any energy had left, leaving him feeling brittle and agonizingly vulnerable. 

Magic was an amazing tool, had saved his life more than once when he was traveling across Eos with Noct, but… but a human body could only handle so much. And Prompto had long since reached and overpassed his limit. The very thing that was keeping him alive was killing him. 

Of course, Ardyn did not care. The only reason he is even alive right now is because the Chancellor needs something to play with until Noct gets here. Prompto is bait being dangled just above the prince’s head. The sadistic bastard is hurting Prom to hurt Noct. The blond is pretty sure that Ardyn is gonna kill him in front of Noctis when the slowpoke finally gets here. The thought scared him in the beginning. But now he is just too tired to really care. He’s so tired. 

Suddenly, the hinges of his cell door creak loudly, and Ardyn waltzes into the room, “Good morning, my dear!” he says cheerfully. The first couple days (how long has he been here? Weeks? Months?  _ Years?  _ He has no way of knowing for sure, Ardyn can manipulate fucking  _ reality)  _ he was here he might’ve given the Chancellor a snarky reply, maybe spit at his feet if he was feeling particularly daring. But now? Now he is just too tired, doesn’t even lift his head to acknowledge the taller man. 

“Not even a hello? My, my… how rude,” there is an underlying stiffness in the red head’s lackadaisical admonishment that has Prompto whimpering weakly. Ardyn steps closer, hands behind his back. Brown eyes gleaming in the dim light as he circles Prompto lazily, assessing. 

It feels as if his heart is trying to burst from his chest, blood pounds in his ears as Ardyn disappears from his peripherals. Nearly jumping out of his skin as a gloved hand gently brushes his shoulder as Ardyn hums consideringly.

Prompto seizes up with a grunt when the telltale sound of a potion being broken sounds and his body is flooded with acidic magic that stitches the welts on his back closed but wreaks havoc on his insides. Liquid magma has been poured into his poor abused veins and his blood coughs and splutters through his body as the magic poisons him. His heartbeat would make a hummingbird jealous, his pupils dilated, and a strange glow shines below his skin. 

He had the forethought to grit his teeth beforehand so he doesn’t bite through his tongue again; his jaw aches with the force and he vaguely thinks that he wishes Ardyn would put a gag back in his mouth like he had done when Prom first got to Zegnautus and wouldn’t shut up so he would have something to bite down on. He couldn’t scream even if he wanted to, can only dangle there as burning magic eats away at his very cells. His spine arching up as the pain continues. 

“Oh my, this is the most severe magic sickness I have seen,” Ardyn comments absently as he runs his fingers along Prompto’s quivering stomach. “Hang in there, Prompto. I’m sure Noctis will get here soon.”

It takes a long few minutes for the pain to subside from a burn to a throbbing ache. Prompto sags into his restraints, takes in wheezing gasps of air, and trembles. It is hard to breathe like this, hanging from his wrists. To get a full breath he needs to pull up slightly, but he lost the strength to do so after the first few days in Ardyn’s clutches. Instead, he has to struggle half breaths, it feels as if he just ran a mile and is trying to breathe through a straw. His head spins and all he can think is  _ not enough.  _ Not enough  _ fucking air.  _

Ardyn rounds in front of him, a smirk pulling at his lips as he watches Prompto struggle for air silently. He heaves several wheezing breaths, blinking at the tall man through the curtain of his bangs. Their eyes lock and the Chancellor tilts his head to the side, cocking a brow meaningfully. Prompto does not know what he is trying to communicate. Instead of trying to understand the other man, he physically gathers himself, raising his head slightly and spits at Ardyn’s feet; his whole body going slack in exhaustion at the action. 

The chancellor blinks down at the wad of pink foamy spit that missed his pristine boots by mere inches. Instead of anger, however, he seems almost pleased. “You know… I  _ was  _ planning on torturing you into insanity and sicking you on our darling Noctis, forcing him to kill you. But alas, it seems I’ve underestimated you,” he raises a gloved hand to cup the blond’s cheek. He squeezes his eyes shut with a whimper at the gentle touch; hating that a part of him wants to lean into the hand and suck up whatever comfort he can, even if it is from his tormentor. 

It has been so long since anyone has touched him without pain following right afterward, he feels as if he is starving for it. He craved the warmth radiating off of Ardyn’s palm like an addict. 

And by the gleam in Ardyn’s empty brown eyes he knows it, “One may not be held at fault for thinking you  _ like  _ this. Naughty boy.” 

Prom feels absolutely defeated, he has been beaten down so thoroughly he just wants to hide away from everything and not try to fight anymore. But of course, that stupid stubborn voice that sounds an awful lot like Noctis tells him that he can’t give up. Not yet. 

His eyes flash red with his sudden resolve and the blond abruptly lashes out with razor-sharp fangs, aiming to bite the smug bastard’s fucking fingers off. 

Ardyn retracts his hand and  _ laughs, “ _ Just a few days of torture and you’ve already reactivated the plasmodium in your body! At this rate you’ll become a demon before our dear Noctis shows up!” of course, he sounded absolutely  _ delighted  _ about that. Prompto snarled at him, red eyes glowing. 

Something the Chancellor said caught his attention, though. A  _ few days?  _ He had thought he had been here for weeks. 

“Your body is already changing from the minute amount of plasmodium injected into you as an infant,” Ardyn observes, “It has been laying dormant within you for twenty years; who knew that all you had to do to reactivate it was to put your body through… hm, immense stress,” he spoke as if Prompto was no more than an interesting test subject, an experiment to study and dissect. 

The Chancellor’s brown eyes are narrowed and a dangerous look darkens his chiseled features as he continues to stare at Prompto, deep in thought. His silence is unnerving. Dread twists in his stomach as the silence stretches on and on, the only sound being the general groans and creaks of Zegnautus Keep. 

Ardyn’s eerie silence ends with the snap of his fingers, making Prompto jolt every so slightly at the noise, swaying gently in the air. A moment of silence, followed by the horribly familiar rhythmic clanking of metal boots coming closer. He squeezes his eyes shut, the dried blood caked to the side of his face pulling at his skin uncomfortably. 

An MT marches into the cell, coming to a stop in front of Prompto. Revulsion all but chokes him and he grimaces in disgust at the hollow…  _ thing  _ that just, just  _ stands there  _ and stares a thim with a blank green mask. A dark foreboding aura radiates from the unit, like a cloud. Just being in the same room as one of this twisted, horrible creatures makes his empty stomach roil and he has to fight off a gag.  _ That could've been me,  _ he thinks hysterically. Gazing up, his eyes glowing red behind the curtain of his bangs, he lifts a lip to flash his sharp fangs and black gums. 

Ardyn gasped, “ _ Prompto!  _ Is that any way to treat your  _ little  _ brother?” he mocked, holding a hand to his face. His red gaze flickered between the MT and to the Chancellor, leaning his head against his shoulder as he gazed numbly at the metal wall behind Ardyn. Really, he just hoped whatever game Ardyn was planning would be over soon.  _ Heh, not fucking likely,  _ he thought bitterly to himself.

Prompto had learned fast and hard that Ardyn liked to take it slow, liked to play with his food like a cat and mouse. The sadistic bastard took glee in Prompto’s screams, his pleas, his begging. Would carve him up for hours just because he was bored. He didn’t  _ want  _ anything from Prompto, he didn’t want information, didn’t want locations, or names, or strategies, or anything like that. He was inflicting pain just for pain's sake. Which in some ways made it so much  _ worse _ .

The thing is... Prompto could handle that -- the torture, he means -- he could handle being whipped, and beaten, and burned, and drowned. He  _ could.  _ But when Ardyn started to… pretend to be Noct,  _ that's  _ when he truly felt like he was starting to break. 

The first time it had happened, Prom had been completely fooled. He had no reason to think otherwise, afterall. Fake-Noct had come barging into his cell, looking pristine and so  _ so  _ worried, spouting apologies and asking if he was alright. Gently untying him, brushing away the blond’s tears of relief with a heartbreaking smile. He doesn’t think he had ever been so relieved and happy in his life. But that happiness turned to ash in his mouth when at the exit of the keep, the sun visible shining through the doorway, Noctis’s expression had shifted into a crazed smirk and suddenly instead of his best friend next to him it was  _ Ardyn _ .

Apparently, Ardyn had found a new game to play. And boy did he  _ love  _ playing it. His favorite was disguising himself as people from Prompto’s life and pretending like they were there to save him. Sometimes he would just disguise himself as one of his friends and torture him for hours, using Ignis’s voice to tell him he was never good enough, or Gladio’s large hands choking the air from his lungs. Eventually Prompto stopped hoping that maybe  _ this time  _ it was the real Ignis or Nocits. When any of his friends burst through the doors, saying they were there to save him, he wouldn’t even raise his head, wouldn’t even acknowledge them. Just tried not to cry and hoped if he didn’t get a response Ardyn would tire from this new game. 

Of course he never really did. Sometimes there would be a long stretch between the… tricks. But Ardyn never fully stopped doing it. 

Prompto thinks the worst one was the second time Ardyn had disguised himself as Noct. The blonde had not learned his lesson from the first time and had believed that  _ this time  _ it was the real one. He had told the fake-Noct to tell him something only the two of them would know, and fake-Noct had smiled and said “you have a chocobo onesie that you wear when no one is around” and Prompto had laughed, because surely Ardyn wouldn’t know something stupid like that right? 

Fake-Noct had taken his hand and gently began to lead Prompto through the labyrinth that was Zegnautus, and had stopped at a resting room with several rows of bunk beds. “Let’s take a break here, yeah?” Noct had whispered into his ear and Prompto was so  _ so  _ tired he had nodded with relief. He had curled up into his prince’s side, burying his face into the other man’s chest. 

Maybe if his nose wasn’t plugged with dried blood he might’ve noticed that the Noct that was with him didn’t smell right. Maybe if he had bothered to look up he might’ve noticed the maniacal grin that stretched across fake-Noct’s face. Maybe if he wasn’t so fucking stupid and naive he might’ve noticed that this was too good to be true. 

But he didn’t notice, and he had sighed into fake-Noct’s chest and whispered “I love you,” because at that moment he needed Noct to know that. He had felt relief when fake-Noct had tightened his hold on Prompto and his stomach had fluttered warmly as Noct leaned forward and his breath brushed the blond’s ear. 

The moment was shattered when instead of Noct’s voice it was  _ Ardyn  _ who spoke into his ear and said “I am touched,  _ darling _ .” 

Another  _ game  _ that Prompto was forced to take part in was Ardyn setting him loose in the keep without a weapon and telling him to  _ run.  _ Ardyn liked the hunt, it seemed. Logically, he knew that there was no way he could escape Zegnautus, but there was always an agonizing flare of hope deep in his chest that  _ this time  _ he would get lucky and get out of here. But Ardyn always caught him eventually, every single time.

Ardyn thrived on Prompto’s humiliation and fear and his crumbling sense of humanity. He would croon sweet praises in the blond’s ear like a lover as he twisted a knife into his skin. Would rub his tears away with gentle shushing noises, as if he were comforting him. The juxtaposition was so confusing and strangely painful, deep in his chest. 

The only warning Prompto has is the click of a button being pressed before the shackles holding him aloft release and he falls to the floor  _ hard.  _ He wheezes face down on the floor, trying to gather his breath vainly. His fingers felt like they were being stabbed with a million red hot needles, his arms pulsed with fire, his shoulders aching with a sharp bone deep pain that brought tears to his eyes. Curling into a tight ball, Prompto could only squeeze his eyes shut and breathe. He cried tearlessly, broken sobs that tore through his raw throat. 

Harsh clanking footfalls marched up to his prone body, his eyes glowed menacingly from the floor as the MT came to a stop next to him and mechanically grabbed his shoulder and hauled him to his feet. Or tried to, at least. The MT ended up half carrying him and half dragging him behind Ardyn who had turned and flounced out of his cell with a happy little noise. 

The MT is tall, much taller than Prompto, and its armor clunks loudly with each step it takes. It’s head is fixed straight ahead where Ardyn continues to saunter along. Never even sparing Prompto a glance, which now that he thinks of it would be more unsettling. Prompto wants to growl at it. He can feel the starscourge radiating from the creature and it flips his stomach. It feels as if he were touching a corpse, a vile empty shell that sets his hair on end. A nauseous feeling to settle in his stomach and he swallows thickly. The blonde thinks if he had any food in his stomach at that moment he would’ve thrown up at the first touch. 

His bare feet drag painfully against the grated floor, but he doesn’t have the energy to try and get his feet underneath him. And he can do nothing at all as he is dragged to what he is starting to think is his doom. 

Suddenly, his violet eyes catch something at the MT’s hip. A singular pistol strapped to its belt. Prompto stares at the gun, stares as it sways with each step of the Magitek Unit, stares at the reflection of the overhead lights against the smooth metal. He cannot take his eyes off the weapon. 

He closes his eyes and lets his body go completely limp, resting it as best as he can before he does the stupidest thing in his life. He takes long and deep breaths, fights the fear and panic that rises up. Squeezing his eyes shut, he lets out one final deep shaky breath. His eyes snap open and he lifts his head, glaring up through the sheet of his bangs; red eyes practically glowing in the dim hallway. In a burst of strength he threw himself out of the MT’s hold; kicking the back of the thing’s leg in, causing it to collapse. Not wasting any time, he grabbed the gun -- refusing to acknowledge how perfectly the demon’s pistol fit into his hand -- and shot one bullet into the scourged creature’s temple. 

Ardyn had only the time to turn at the noise before Prompto emptied the clip into his fucking skull. 

_ Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! Bang! _ The noise echoed and ricocheted off the metal walls. His ears were ringing, from the loud noise of the pistol or from something else he did not know. Ardyn’s body collapsed onto the floor in a pile. Prompto waited for the relief, the vicious satisfaction at filling the Chancellor’s skull full of lead,  _ anything.  _ But instead, he feels… nothing. Only cold numbness. 

He couldn’t do anything, only stare blankly at his tormentor’s limp body, and could only watch as black blood began to pool around the man’s head. He lifted a hand to his mouth and was surprised that, instead of gagging, he ended up sobbing into his palm. It wasn’t relief that filled his lungs, but something… else. Something unpleasant and suffocating. He could not breathe. He couldn’t breathe, he  _ couldn’t-- _

Squeezing his eyes shut, he forced a slow and shaky breath. It took a long few minutes before he felt like he had taken his breath back again, and he dropped the gun still held tightly in his hand onto the floor, stepping over Ardyn’s body. His legs were shaky and he stumbled clumsily with every limping step down the hall. He didn’t have the slightest idea how to escape Zegnautus Keep, he just needed to get away from Ardyn, dead or not. 

He felt sticky with blood and sweat and would've given anything to lower himself into a nice warm bath. Specifically with Noct there, seated behind him to run soothing hands up and down his arms. And to press soft kisses against his neck and to whisper that everything was okay that he wouldn’t have to hurt anymore. 

Prompto shook his head, grimacing at the headache it caused. He couldn’t allow himself to think about those things. Usually he was much better at controlling it, but he hadn’t slept in days and it seems wishful thinking was getting the better of him.

Prom had been in love with Noctis since their freshman year in high school. He had hoped, prayed really, that the feelings would go away eventually. But it only grew stronger as the years passed. The blond was well aware that even  _ if  _ Noct felt the same way, it would never work. He was just some poor orphan nobody (and very obviously from Niflheim with his light coloring), and a  _ boy,  _ there was no way the two of them would ever be allowed to be in a romantic relationship. Noctis had a duty as the prince of Lucius, Prompto would never make that duty any harder by placing  _ feelings  _ in the way. Even if it hurt so so much to do so. 

The day that it was announced that Noctis would marry the Lady Lunafreya Prompto had thought for sure his heart had shattered. He had curled up in bed and tried to keep himself from falling apart. Without even knowing it, Prompto had held a drop of hope that just  _ maybe  _ Noct would return his feelings and fight for Prompto to be at his side but… that small naive hope had been shattered. By the six, he was just so stupid sometimes. 

At his core, Prompto was just a horribly stupid, naive, scared little boy. 

The blond paused as he came to an intersection of hallways, leaning heavily on the wall he tried to look for anything to tell him which way to go. Even lifted his face into the air to sniff, like that would do anything. There was no signs, and everything looked the same in this stupid fucking keep. With no other option than to simply guess, Prompto turned left. Then right. Then left again. Minutes ticked by, the only sounds were the groans and creaks of the metal keep and Prompto’s labored breath. 

All the breath left Prompto’s lungs as something cold grabbed him from behind just after he turned down another hallway, “That was  _ rude.”  _ Ardyn hissed into his ear, voice like ice and death. Horror suffocates him and he freezes like a deer in headlights, unable to do anything as the Chancellor digs his hand into Prompto's left arm. 

The next few moments are confusing. He is flying through the air, then he is skidding across the grated floor, rolling to a stop on his side. He lays crumpled on the floor unable to breathe with all of the air in his lungs being forced out. He tries and fails to breathe and just lays there, gaping like a fish. 

He can’t feel anything and his blood roars too loudly in his veins to hear anything, but something deep within him that is nothing but instinct is screaming that something is  _ wrong.  _ He gasps blankly at the ceiling as he tries to figure out what that something is. The arm that Ardyn had initially grabbed feels… weird. Confused, he blinks the blood from his eyes and forces them to focus on his left arm.

All he sees is red. Frowning, he blinks once. Twice. His vision blurs a moment before sharpening again and he realizes that there is a void where his arm should be but isn’t. He is confused, unable to process. The pain is a distant cold sensation that is easily ignored as his mind tries to figure out  _ why  _ his arm isn’t there. 

Ardyn stalked closer to his crumpled form, “Oops,” the tall man said lackadaisickly, dropping  _ Prompto’s fucking arm  _ onto the floor next to him. He could only stare at the bloody limp hand, wondering how his arm could be over  _ there  _ when he was  _ here.  _

“It seemed I went a little overboard,” Ardyn sighs, taking a handful of Prompto’s hair to haul him up. “Oh dear, what are we going to do? You won’t last till our dear Noctis arrives,” he sounded frustrated, like it was somehow Prompto’s fault that darkness was beginning to creep in around the edges of his vision. 

Ardyn growls in annoyance, one-handedly gropes around Prompto’s pants to pull his belt off and wrap it tight around the stub of his arm as a makeshift tourniquet. Prompto whimpers, weakly trying to push Ardyn away. 

“Shut up,” the Chancellor hisses, slamming his head into the floor. 

Everything became blurry after that. his eyes drooping as Ardyn dragged him by his remaining arm through the halls of Zegnatus. His vision going in and out of focus and his conscious mind wandered a bit. He was vaguely aware of a shackle being tightened back onto his bony wrist and being lifted off the ground by his arm. The clanking of chains makes him think they were back in his cell, but the air smells foul and rotten like a dead rotting sickness that permeates the air and burns the back of his throat and makes his skin prickle uncomfortably. 

He blinks blurrily, they are in a lab of some sort. With a high ceiling and a large pool of roiling black… something in the middle of the room. There is an array of machinery all around the room that beeps and whirs, and an observation deck overlooking the pool with various computers with blank monitors. Harsh light shines from the fluorescent bulbs on the dangling lamps above them and causes the back of his red eyes to ache. 

“Normally, being submerged in the starscourge would instantly vaporize a person.” Ardyn is saying conversationally from the observation deck, fiddling with some controls. “But you aren’t normal, are you Prompto? No, no you’re  _ special _ .” 

His body is in shock and he can’t even begin to process what the Chancellor is implying or planning to do. He cannot make the connection of why he is in this room with a pool full of… starscourge, of all things. Why is he here? He wants to go back to his cell, because at least his cell is familiar. 

“Though this might very well kill you, but I suppose you are going to die anyway,” he says pleasantly as he presses a button and manipulates a joystick. There is a whirring noise above him and the chain wrapped around Prompto’s tattooed wrist goes taught and he is being hauled from the ground. Blood soaks the entirety of his left side and drips from his toes as he is placed above the pool of ichor that seems to roil with excitement. His blood sizzles as if it were touching a red hot iron as it falls into the plasmodium and Prompto can only struggle weakly, swaying slightly. 

“If you do die, my dear, I will be  _ severely  _ disappointed,” Ardyn says in that voice that makes Prompto’s stomach shrivel up. “Have a nice swim.” 

There is a moment where he is falling through empty air and then everything is black and burning and  _ consuming andnonoithurtsithurtsnonopleasenodarkhungryhungrystarvingcoldnoctisnoctNOCT _


	2. Chapter 2

It’s dark. 

Prompto is scared of the dark. He’s so scared. It’s cold. Where… where is he? He wants to go home.  _ Where is home? _ He… doesn’t know.  _ Home is… home is warmth and safety _ . But he has forgotten what warmth feels like. It’s so cold. 

He can’t breathe. This realization sends a bolt of energy through him and he chokes on ichor. Clawing at the  _ burningconsumingcoldemptiness  _ around him, his fingers sliding through the slimey miasma and he struggles and writhes within the depths of darkness unable to breathe or think. He needs to get out, he needs to breathe, he needs to find Noct. He needs to find and protect him, he can’t remember why.

With the desperate strength of an animal fighting for their life, Prompto struggles in the depths of the starscourge. Every moment he is in here the more his consciousness is being taken from him. He can feel it, his memories being burned away and replaced with desperate hunger and anger. Down to the marrow of his bones he is  _ changing _ . He can feel his skin being ripped apart as something bursts from within him, his teeth  _ ache  _ as they fall out and are swiftly replaced with sharp canines. The base of his spine is on fire, his legs feel as if they were being shattered with a hammer and he wants to scream but when he opens his mouth miasma forces its way down his throat and begins to burn away his insides till he is nothing but an empty husk. 

A glowing blue spectral claw bursts from the pool of roiling black scourge suddenly, see-through talons sinking into the rim of the pool. Prompto hissed as he hauls himself out, the darkness seems to try and pull him back with slimy tendrils that he fights against with a desperate grunt, rolling away from the pool and hacks up a lungful of starscourge onto the tile. The black ichor sizzles as it hits the polished stone, corroding the floor. 

His body is covered in black bone-like armor that protrudes from his pale skin; ebony scales scattering his cheeks, shoulders, and sides. His left arm is opaque and glowing a bright blue from the elbow down, the glow contrasting heavily with the spiked armor on his arms. Underneath his arms and along the sides of his ribs are several vents that glow between the thick scales. A long, thick plated tail waves behind him as he shook the scourge from his hair and eyes. A horrible pained noise escapes his throat and Prompto is struck by how… unhuman the noise is. 

Whimpering, he raises a black clawed hand to his throbbing head only to stiffen as his talons come into contact with… horns? Several ragged pairs of black horns protrude through his hair, curling in different directions around his head like some twisted crown. It  _ hurts.  _ Everything hurts but most of all there is an agonizing emptiness between his ribs; pressing his glowing hand to the center of his chest, Prompto tries frantically to feel for what could possibly be wrong. There is nothing there, only black scales and pale flesh. It hurts so bad. He can’t do this, it  _ hurts!  _ He  _ can’t-- _

A raucous alarm blares, causing him to flinch. Pointed ears pulled back against his skull, Prompto curls into a tight ball with his tail curled tightly around him and bares sharp fangs at the ceiling angrily. Red lights begin to flash and an automated voice from the speakers says something Prompto cannot understand. It’s scary. The noise and the lights and the… everything is  _ scary.  _ He doesn’t know what is happening or who he is, all he knows that everything about this situation is  _ wrong.  _ And he needs to  _ leave _ .

Rolling over onto his front, the demon hauls himself to his feet; stumbling over as he tries to gain his balance. His tail is so  _ heavy!  _ And his legs feel so strange! It is hard to find his center of balance and it takes a couple more tries before he is able to awkwardly stumble through the only exit he can see. 

It doesn’t take long for him to get the hang of walking and in mere minutes he is sprinting through the narrow halls on all fours. Not knowing where he is going, just that he needs to find a way out. Crawling on the ceiling, Prompto scents the air, trying to find any hint of anything besides the smell of cold wet metal and blood. Grumbling to himself, the blond demon continues down the hall. Leaping from the ceiling to the floor, he lands in a crouch, thick tail waving behind him. 

The halls are filled with metal corpses of MTs that make Prompto’s lip curl in disgust, despite the remnants of something that smells  _ delicious  _ clinging to them. It only took a quick look to find that whatever the smell was is no longer within these metal husks and Prompto destroys one with his claws in anger at this before continuing on his journey. 

He is uneasy, these halls bring back horrible memories of being hunted and chased and hurt. He wants to leave right now. But all the halls look the same and even if there were signs that pointed to the exit, Prompto isn’t in the right state of mind to read them. 

It is hard to hear anything over the blare of the alarms, but Prompto stiffens as his large pointed ears catch the noise of fighting. The roar of a battle cry and the sound of swords against flesh and the grunts and pants of battle. Pausing, the blond shifts his weight uneasily, trying to swallow past the fear that suffocates him. He is scared. Scared of the noise. Scared of everything. 

Without much thought, Prompto goes in the exact opposite direction of the fighting. 

He wanders the halls for a long time, but eventually he catches the barest whiff of fresh air and stalks towards the scent with a feeling of relief. He is very happy to be almost out of here. It’s scary here. As soon as he spots the exit, Prompto launches himself through the air and rips the metal door off its hinges with his mismatched claws and bursts through the gaping hole he leaves behind with a roar. He is out! The air is so crisp and fresh he gasps it down almost desperately, the cool icey air feels amazing against his burnt lungs. 

Snow falls gently around the mangled and looming fortress of Zegnautus Keep, the sky dark and foreboding. It is so quiet out here, a sharp and relieving contrast to the loud blaring alarm that Prompto can still hear faintly from here. Without much thought, Prompto decides that he needs to get as far away from here as possible. 

He is scared that the Bad Man,  _ Ardyn,  _ will come after him. Ardyn can teleport and always managed to know where he was, with luck maybe if he gets far enough away the monster will not be able to find him. He hopes so. Prompto would rather die than be captured again. 

A shockwave of power interrupts his thoughts from the heart of Zegnautus and the blond demon squeaks in surprise and takes off like a bullet. Something that Prompto didn’t even know he was sensing has disappeared. Something important has been sealed away and that knowledge brings a strange sense of longing that Prompto does not understand. 

He pauses next to the remains of a crumpled burning car, making an inquisitive noise and scenting the air. Something about the ruins of this particular machinery is familiar, and a sudden and confusing stab of sadness constricts painfully within his chest. Snarling at the wreckage, Prompto slashes his blue claw through the metal angrily, as if it were somehow the smoldering car’s fault for the random burst of sadness. 

Huffing, the demon turns and stalks away grumpily. He doesn’t want to be here anymore; he needs to… needs to find someone. Who? An image of dark hair and blue eyes flashes behind his glowing red eyes but it is gone as soon as it comes. Glowering, Prompto continues through the ruins of the city, snow falling silently around him. 

Pausing in the middle of an empty intersection, the blond raises his blue claw and watches as snowflakes land on his see-through palm and sizzle up at first contact. In that moment he forgets his hunger and just watches the snow in quiet fascination. It’s so quiet here. There is nothing living here despite all the evidence that there  _ used  _ to be. He is standing in the ruins of a decimated city and that… makes him sad. With a huff of clouded breath, Prompto continues on. The snow has now accumulated enough that he leaves behind clawed footprints. 

He walks for a long time. The hunger continues, relentlessly twisting his insides. The snow is now up to his knees and he struggles to even take a step. Annoyed, the demon sends out a shockwave of blue magic from his left hand at the white powder and is immediately blinded by a dense cloud of snow that bursts back into his face. Snarling, Prompto is about to repeat unleash his unbridled anger back onto the snow when his legs suddenly give out from under him. 

Intense pain rages inside him and Prompto curls into a tight ball in the snow, cradling his stomach as he lets out a strange whimpering noise. The ichor in his body ran colder than the snow he lay in. His veins felt dry and brittle as if they were about to shatter and his black blood seemed to sputter and cough through him weakly. His vents flare as the pain in his stomach spiked and he stiffens before curling further into himself. 

He has never been so hungry. Not even when he began to lose weight and had been so desperate for results he would only eat one sandwich a day. This was a whole other beast. It went beyond starvation, beyond need, beyond controlling. 

_ More. More. More.  _ The dark, growling voice in his head repeated over and over and over again.  _ More what?  _ He wanted to scream back at the voice. He didn’t know what he needed, what his body was shutting down without. 

It was there, laying in the dark and the snow, that a noise broke the icey silence. Perking up, Prompto raised his head, shaking off the snow from his horns. And looked out across the cold wasteland around him curiously. 

A singular goblin trotted through the snow.

Eyes flashing, Prompto rolled onto all fours and launched himself through the air faster than a blink. Tackling the unsuspecting creature to the ground, the demon sunk his glowing claw into its flesh and relished in the shriek of agony the thing let out. Fangs ripped into the rough textured throat of the goblin, Prompto had to fight the urge to go limp with ecstasy as starscourge flooded into his mouth. Hooking his claws deeper into the panicking demon, so it had no chance of escape, the horned demon consumed the starscourge like a man possessed. His vents flared and pulsed with light. The cold of his body was quickly replaced with raging heat and he could not stop the pleased purr from rumbling out of his chest. 

_ Yes yes yes yes!  _ The dark voice in his head sang, and Prompto smiled against the screeching demon.  _ This  _ is what he needed! He needed to eat demons! Oh, it was so simple, how had he not seen it? How had he gone for so long without figuring it out?

Raising his left hand above the gurgling smaller demon, Prompto flexed his claws and the glow of his arm increased for a second and the goblin  _ screamed  _ as the rest of the starscourge within its body was ripped from it and began to accumulate into a small black sphere between the blond demon’s glowing claws. Within moments, the goblin’s body disintegrated and slipped through his hold to stain the snow with black ash. Prompto didn’t even notice and took a long lingering bite of the sphere of compacted scourge with a whine of relief. Black miasma poured down his front, but he didn’t care, was too relieved and happy to care. He closed his eyes and finished his meal with a pleased noise. 

It was over far too quickly. The blond looked around the frozen wasteland around him, making a small noise in the back of his throat at the fact that there wasn’t just another demon waiting in line for him to devour. He needed more. He was still so  _ hungry.  _ He needed to eat, needed it more than he needed to breathe. A deadly sort of calm determination filled him then. 

It was time to go hunting. 

With this thought, he got to his feet and with renewed energy he was able to walk atop the snow as if it were solid and began to search for his next meal. Days passed, but he didn’t know it since there was no days. Not anymore. There was only night. There was only his next kill. Only the need to consume. He was constantly starving, but consuming starscourge took the edge off. 

The plasmodium had an indescribable taste. Like fire and lightning and death and cold all mixed together in a beautiful cocktail that filled him to the brim with energy and  _ power.  _ The texture was thicker than blood and slimey in a way he might’ve found grotesque in a previous life, but now he relished in the feel of it against his scales. It would drip from his chin and splatter across his front and Prompto would drag his claws along his skin and lick his talons clean to not waste a single drop.

His glowing arm, the one he had lost to the Bad Man, was particularly effective against other demons. They would shriek and shrill when he so much as brushed the see-through talons against them, as if it were a red hot iron. He could gather starscourge into a tightly compacted ball with it, and as he consumed more demons he discovered new things he could do with it every day. Sending a shockwave of blue slashes through the air, reaching across long distances to snatch unsuspecting demons and drag them back to him, and creating small blue flames that never extinguished. 

But soon, the devouring of scourge began to take effect on his mind. Whatever memories he had held from after he became a demon began to fade. Little things at first, like the name of his neighbor's cat, or what his first-ever camera looked like. Then bigger things, like the first time he met… the man with dark hair and blue eyes, or what his parents looked like. From there everything began to fade away like a thick fog. 

He doesn't remember who he is. 

He forgets who his friends are.

It forgets it is human. 

All that is left is the need for more more  **more** .

* * *

A new demon pops up a few weeks after the last light. 

It’s humanoid. With black, scaled armor, long gold hair, and a thick plaited tail. Apparently, it's got a glowing arm and a strange habit of eating other demons too. It’s a tiny bastard, as far as demons go, just barely the size of a normal person. According to the scant reports they have on the thing it walks in equal parts on two and four legs, doesn’t go near human settlements, and instead lingers around demon hot zones where it feasts for hours on black scourge before wandering off and hunting for more. It never stops hunting. It’s always hungry. 

Gladio supposes they should be lucky the thing hasn’t attacked anyone -- yet. On the latest report of the thing it was seen taking down a red giant with ease and bathing in the starscourge it left behind. 

Personally, he isn’t about to put faith in some third-hand account that is more legend than fact. He can admit it is a cool story if nothing else: a glowing demon that eats other demons. Less demons for Gladio and Ignis to deal with if it is true, he supposes.

By the time the two remaining crownsguard had made it back to Lucis, their home had already been made into ruins. The long night and the resulting demons, that were stronger than ever before without the sun to help weaken them) had taken an unimaginable loss, millions of people died within weeks. Luckily the last traces of civilization had scrounged up together and had managed to form pretty secure fortresses around the bigger cities and towns. 

Him and Iggy were staying in Lestallum a couple of years into the long night when the generators that kept the lights on, and thus the demons at bay, had been attacked by a horde.

“Do be careful,” Ignis tells him quietly as he gears up to kick some ass. A soft, almost vulnerable tremble to his voice. Gladio pauses at the door and a horrible bittersweet pain settles in his chest as he turns to the blind man and smiles sadly, “Always am, Iggy,” 

They had both lost  _ everything _ . Their home, their king, their friends. Even Prompto. That bastard Ardyn had insinuated that the blond had met his end through demons when they were making their way through Zegnautus keep. And while normally Gladio wouldn’t believe a word that man said, he knew that Ardyn would never pass up a chance to flaunt just how powerful he was. If Prompto was alive when they had gotten there, the blond would’ve been dangled above their heads and would’ve been used as bait. 

And Noctis knew that well, the king had had a breakdown in one of the barracks they had used to rest in. Screaming and crying and clawing at his arms as he came to the realization that his best friend was dead and Gladio didn’t have the heart to try and make the man  _ calm the fuck down  _ because he was on the verge of a panic attack too. 

“It’s my fault,” Noctis had whispered from where he had pushed himself in the corner of the room to curl up in the smallest ball possible. “I pushed him off the train, he would still be here with us if…” the man let out a horrible pained whine, “He died thinking I hated him, he’s dead, he’s dead.  _ Ignis!”  _ But for the first time in his life Ignis hadn’t been able to fix this. 

“If Ardyn had wanted to take Prompto, there is nothing you could’ve done to stop that,” Gladio had finally muttered, ignoring Ignis’s hiss of reprimand at his dark tone. He pushed himself off the wall and crouched in front of his king, who looked so  _ broken.  _ The ring had already taken its toll and he had looked frail and brittle, dark rings under his eyes. “It is  _ not  _ your fault,” he had said firmly. 

Noctis had stared at him with glassy eyes and had launched himself into the shield’s arms and cried and cried and  _ cried.  _ Gladio held him tight and ignored the few tears that gathered in his own eyes and instead focused on one of his closest friends who needed him more than ever right then. 

Of course right after that, as they had begun to make their way through the labyrinth of halls once again,  _ Ardyn  _ had begun to play recordings of Prompto being fucking  _ tortured.  _ But now, instead of breaking down, Noctis was overcome with a cold fury that even set Gladio on edge. He had never seen the king so angry, magic had crackled around his clenched hands and he stalked through the halls in front of them with a single-minded determination that was so unlike the normally aloof prince. Gladio had truly believed that they would be able to beat this bastard that night. 

But then Noctis had gotten sealed into the crystal and everything had fallen apart. 

Shaking his head, Gladio forced himself to stop thinking about that night and focused back on Ignis. The Scienta was in charge of a million and one things in Lestallum and was forced to stay here and take charge of the chaos instead of accompanying the Shield to go clear the generators of demons. 

“See ya soon, specs,” It was the last thing he wanted to do, leave Ignis (there was always that looming fear that he too would disappear the moment Gladio turned away), but he had a job to do and he had to go. Ignis didn’t say anything, merely giving the taller man a curt nod and Gladio turned away and headed out the door. 

He had a squad of demon hunters accompanying him, most of them were greenies but they were all Lestallum could spare. There was a particular blond kid that set Gladio’s teeth on edge, the kid didn’t know when to get out of the way and always ended up getting hurt. Like someone else he knew. It seemed every skinny blond kid the Shield ever saw reminded him painfully of Prompto and it was fucking  _ annoying.  _ He knew he was hard on the kid, but damn could he not handle it if the twink offed himself being stupid. 

With a sigh, the tall man hauled himself into the passenger side of the jeep, nodding to the driver who looked particularly nervous. There were four cars in total, carrying twenty demon hunters to the generators. It was a short drive to their destination, and Gladio jumps out of the vehicle before it comes to a complete stop, the gravel crunching beneath his boots. 

He swiftly begins to trek into the forest and towards the generators, his squad scrambling after him. Hopefully they can finish this up and be back in lestallum within the hour, Ignis had mentioned he would make authentic ramen for dinner tonight after all. 

As they make their way through the surrounding forest a thick fog begins to creep in, Gladio frowns and shines his flashlight around them. No demons yet. But this fog isn’t natural and his hunter instincts flare that demons are near. Without a word he unhooks his sword from his back and walks with it in hand, his squad scrambles to do the same.

The clicking and moaning of demons began to sound and silhouettes began to appear from the fog. And by the time that Gladio realized just how fucked they were it was too late. 

There were too many of them. A wave of demons surrounded the whole squadron, mostly small fries like flan, and goblins, but also several archne and ronins. By the six, it was not his lucky day. The fight lasted hours, he cut down demon after demon but they just kept coming. They had had no casualties yet, but many of the men were injured and fading fast. 

So much for this being a quick clearing out job.

As the number of demons increased

With a snarl, Gladio grabbed the scruff of the blonde kid’s scruff and yanked him away from an arachne's fangs at the last second. “Stay focused, rookie,” he hissed at the kid before shoving him away. 

As he was looking at the dumb kid, there was a flash of blue light, and half of the demons that surrounded them screeched and fell to the ground with dripping black claw marks in them. Still alive but injured greatly. He had no time to dwell on it because with the release of constant pressure him and his squad managed to take out the rest of the demons within ten minutes. 

A blue blur flashed out from the fog and gripped the remaining goblin around the throat, the thing made a screeching noise and sunk its claws into the dirt as it was dragged back into the darkness. It’s shrieked and cried desperately before the cries abruptly cut off, followed by deathly silence. 

“The hell…” the demon hunter next to Gladio muttered. The rest of his squad muttered to each other, nervous and frightened of the unknown creature that lingered just out of their vision. 

“Get ready…” He narrowed his scarred brow, brown eyes assessing the darkness. 

A blue light shines deep in the fog, moving closer, and the scarred man shifts his weight. Then, a silhouette crawls closer and a black blue, and gold creature hesitantly exits the fog. Staring straight at Gladio with red eyes. 

The demon crouches a few meters away, far too close for Gladio’s comfort. Its thick plated tail waves behind it slowly as it makes a strange clicking noise that sets the Shield on edge. Gladio bares his teeth in a bloody snarl as the thing tries to creep closer, making a cooing noise that might’ve been a questioning curious noise if it wasn’t a fucking  _ demon _ . Warily, he watches as the thing crawls on all fours closer, scenting the air and making a frustrated clicking noise to itself.

“C’mon, you freak!” He goads with a snarl. For its part, the demon looks downright taken aback by Gladio’s aggression and hunkers down with a whine, like a skittish dog. “The fuck...” he whispers to himself, unsure of what to do. 

He can barely see the thing’s glowing red eyes from behind its long gold hair. There is something strangely familiar about the demon, something that Gladio could not put his finger on. Maybe it's just the blond hair. Growling to himself, the shield shakes his head. He can’t think about that right now.

The demon's eyes flicker from the Amicitia to something behind him and Gladio doesn’t even have the chance to react before the tiny bastard is launching through the air, right passed him, to tackle a ronin that was trying to sneak up behind him to the ground with an ear-splitting screech. He watches with wide eyes as this demon… eats the other one. It pins the struggling creature with its back talons and tail and does something with that weird glowing hand that seems to almost pull all of the inky black miasma from the thing's body. The blond demon sits there looking pleased as punch as it munches on the ball of plasmodium as the ronin’s body disintegrates still in its claws, not even sparing Gladio a glance. 

Until he moves that is, and the demon’s red eyes snap to him in an instant. But it doesn’t…  _ do  _ anything. Just stares at him quizzically for a moment before offering the leaking ball of starscourge that already has several bites taken out of it up with a curious hum. 

“Er… no thanks,” Gladio manages to get out and the demon almost seems to  _ shrug  _ before it goes back to munching on its meal without a care in the world, closing its glowing eyes and purring to itself. 

Once it finishes, the creature licks its lips with a long black tongue and stares at Gladio scrutinizingly. Then it brings its glowing hand close to its chest and a small blue flame flickers to life between its talons. The demon glares in concentration, blowing a soft breath onto the flame to liven it up.

Then, with great care, the demon sets the flame down between them, it hovers half a foot above the ground like a willo the wisp, and gingerly backs away. When Gladio does nothing, the demon backs away further, watching him expectantly. He must be out of his mind, Gladio thinks to himself as he takes a step towards the little flame. A couple of the demon hunters with him shift and mutter for him to stay back, but Gladio ignores them and kneels next to the little flame. 

The black-armored demon in front of him looks on eagerly as the Shield brings out a hand and gingerly hovers it next to the flame, there is no heat coming from it at all. Instead it is quite cool and with a deep breath, he risks brushing his fingers through it and shudders at the feeling of magic painfully akin to Noctis’s own. Reaching underneath the flame and picking it up, the flickering light hovering a few inches off his palm. His brown eyes look up to the demon and it is starting to back away its red eyes lingering on Gladio for a moment before there is a shift in the fog and the demon is gone. The shield’s gaze flickers between the flame and the spot where the strange demon had last stood, bewildered. 

Ignis is not going to believe this. 

* * *

Prompto had just finished consuming a mindflayer and was picking the demon tentacles off of his armor, grimacing at the suction, in one of the deep cavern systems that are scattered throughout what once was Lucis, when he hears something. 

Curious, he rises to his feet and silently follows the noise. He has been wandering these demon-infested caves for a couple weeks now (not that he is aware of the passage of time), and is very familiar with the layout of the labyrinth of tunnels and swiftly makes an array of twists and turns, and at one point dropping through a hole in the ground to another level, towards the strange sound. This deep underground noise seems to travel farther than one might expect and Prompto ends up walking for a while longer than he suspects before he finds the source of his curiosity. 

At first, he thinks it might be a ronin or some other humanoid demon, but he scents the air before he pounces and comes to the conclusion that the creature is a  _ human.  _ He hasn’t seen a human in a while, and hasn’t been this close to one since he offered the familiar big angry human some of his food and was turned down (Prompto is still offended by this). 

This human is also familiar too, it has blond hair kind of like Prompto, only more silvery than gold. It lays crumpled on the cold damp ground; if he were to guess, Prompto thinks the poor human fell from high above from one of the upper caves and ended up landing here (this particular cave system was full of large cracks and holes in the stone that made it very dangerous to navigate. Especially for humans who had no claws or tails to help them climb).

Crouching low, he gives the injured human a wide berth as he tries to figure out just what to do. He could leave, and continue hunting, but an annoying mixture of wariness and curiosity keeps him put. Humans don’t wander from their bright people cities very often, the threats of the long night are ever-looming, after all. And only the mean humans that try to hit Prompto with swords, or the people who take plants from the ground ever really come out. He has no need or urge to go near humans either, most of them are mean and scary after all. He hasn't gotten the chance to be this close to one since the sunset for the final time, even the big angry human had stayed really far away from him. 

The vents along his ribs flare as the poor human shifts from where they lay half propped out the cavern wall. They make a small pained sound as they push themselves farther up the wall to properly sit. It is then that Prompto notices the horrible scars across the human’s eyes, they look like they hurt and a part of him wants to crawl closer and lick them to make the human feel better. Something tells him that would do the opposite of soothe, however, so he resits the urge. The human cocks their head to the side, listening. Their eyes are distant and unseeing and Prompto is immediately intrigued. 

There are demons who can’t see, and they use noise to guide themselves around. Prompto can’t do that, and he doesn’t think humans can either. He wonders how exactly this particular human can move around (because surely it had to have wandered in here somehow) without sight. Even Prompto relies on the glow of his left arm to guide him in the darkest of places, he is still scared of the dark even after spending years surrounded by it. 

With a silent release of breath, he risks crawling a little closer to get a better look at the human. Maybe then he can figure out why they’re so  _ painfully familiar.  _ He had tried to do the same with the tall angry human with the big sword but that had almost resulted in him getting cut in half, this human’s daggers don’t look nearly as intimidating. 

A flurry of images and feelings flicker in his mind as he managed to get a good look at the human’s face: a patient yet sarcastic figure, an intelligent yet kind gleam of green eyes, the sizzle of cooking food, long fingers running through his hair. But in the blink of an eye the images are gone and the demon is left with an uncanny sense of loss and shame. 

Shaking his head, long gold hair swaying, the demon lots out a nervous chitter in greeting. The human (the man, he thinks) stiffens and immediately pulls out a blade covered in frost in a flash of movement so quickly the demon could barely process it. He frantically shuffles back and away from the injured man, who holds their ice blade out, ready to strike. 

A tight twisting pain in his chest threatens to steal his breath at the aggression and fear the man shows. He feels almost betrayed, for some reason. An unfamiliar and unwanted pain blossoms within him and he whimpers softly, the man narrows his brow at the noise. The human shouts something at Prompto and the demon whimpers, singing a soft soothing noise to try and quiet the man. 

The noises will attract other demons and while Prompto wouldn’t mind consuming more scourge he doesn’t want the loud human to be hurt. Though, he thinks dubiously, if the loud human’s loudness does not attract other demons the metallic odor of blood in the air would. He glances around in agitation, unsure of what to do. He can already hear the scritching of goblin claws as they scurry through the tunnels, coming closer. He is unsure if he can protect the human if a pack of other demons descends upon them. 

He supposed the best course of action would be to get the loud human out of the caves and back to one of the people cities, where he would be safe. He knew the fastest and safest way out from here, and it would not be too hard to find people to drop the other blond off with. The demon has no way of knowing if the man’s wounds are fatal or not, but he knows humans are very fragile and are easily damaged. He growls in agitation, wanting very much to get the achingly familiar human out of this dangerous place. But he didn’t know how to go about leading the man out of the caves! Certainly not by carrying him. He was sure if he came any closer one of those ice blades would carve into his scales. 

Prompto hissed in reprimand as the man tried to stumble to his feet, the copper stench flaring in the air. The man narrows his eyes in Prompto’s direction, but continues to haul himself to his feet, leaning on the wall. The scritching of approaching claws on stone increases, and Prompto looks around the dark tunnels with a glare. 

Not knowing what else to do, Prompto came to a decision that he did not like. Looping behind the man, he snarled as loud as he could and slashed his claws against the stone, prompting the human to back away from him and towards the tunnel that would eventually lead him out of the caves. 

Of course, this particular human was a warrior and would not run so easily from a foe and with a crack of lightning, they threw one of their daggers at the demon with deadly accuracy. The ice blade  _ sshlicked  _ between the armor plating on his shoulders and sunk deep into his flesh, piercing him through. The golden-haired demon  _ screamed.  _ Screeching as he fell backwards and clawed at the dagger with trembling talons. The area around the blade was  _ cold,  _ his flesh freezing around it. 

With a snarl, he gripped the blade tight and ripped it out of his flesh, blurrily tossing it away. Whimpering, Prompto cowered to the floor. An agonizing sense of betrayal flared in his chest that caused a strange tightness in the back of his throat that made it hard to swallow. For some reason he had wholeheartedly believed that the human would never hurt him, ever. Which is strange because the demon had no reason to trust this particular human, he had no reason to trust anyone. He didn’t even understand the concept of trust, or love, or friendship. There was only the starscourge to him. That was all that mattered. Killing every single demon that crossed his path and destroying them. 

The human man shifted his weight silently, holding his other dagger in a reverse grip and glaring sightlessly in Prompto’s direction. The demon stayed low to the ground and keened lowly, ears pressed flat against his head and tail wrapped tightly around his feet. This human was  _ mean!  _ Mean and scary! But despite that, Prompto didn’t want to leave. Even with the wound on his shoulder oozing black blood he wanted to get the mean human out of these caverns safely. 

In a blur of blue light, Prompto tackled the mean human to the ground and ripped the dagger out of their hand. 

_ ‘Stay.’  _ He thought grumpily, pinning the man to the stone floor. The human struggled furtively, but Prompto was much stronger than any human and easily held him down and withstood the fire, lightning, and ice spells being thrown at him silently until the mean human had exhausted himself and lay underneath him panting heavily. The electricity coursing through his veins from the mean human’s magic reminded him of the bad place where he had been made and Prompto wanted to curl up in a ball and hide away but first he had to get the mean human out of here. 

With shaking legs, the blond demon carefully scooped the man up in his arms and swiftly made his way through the labyrinth of tunnels. Stealthily avoiding any and all demons that wandered in the caves. 

He cradles the man gently in his arms, the human is much bigger than he is and it is a little awkward but he manages just fine and sighs in relief when he can smell the fresh cool air of the eternal night. The man has long since stopped struggling and is now babbling strange noises that Prompto was once able to understand, but no longer. He grumbles back every once in a while back at the man, just to prompt him to talk more. It is… nice to hear someone else’s voice. 

It feels all too soon that he nears one of the big people cities, but in reality, he has been carrying the mean human for hours. As he sets the man down gently he is struck by the realization that… he does not want to leave. He wants to stay with  _ packbrotherfamily.  _

Snarling to himself, Prompto leaves a flickering blue flame next to the injured mean human to ward off other demons and turns and disappears back into the darkness. He forces himself not to look back, and in the coming weeks' forces himself not to wander to the people city to look for the mean human again. 

Prompto decides then and there that he will not go near humans ever again. They are confusing and cause hurts that don’t seem to fade, even after the black wound on his shoulder heals. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bloop! New chapter! I hope you guys like the direction this fic is going and please tell me what you think!  
> I was gonna add in a section where Prompto ran into a herd of chocobos but then I get lazy so... oop, maybe next chapter lol


	3. Chapter 3

“Noctis”

Noctis grumbled, rolling away from the hand that prodded at his cheek. 

“Noct, it’s time to wake up. I made breakfast!” 

“You can’t cook for shit,” Noct grumbled, cracking an eye open to glance at Prompto. He was bathed in ethereal white light that spilled in from the wide windows, he looked beautiful and Noctis was too transfixed on the man in front of him he doesn’t notice the  _ wrongness  _ of the space around him. 

The blond gasped, affronted, “I think even I am capable of cooking some eggs and french toast, thank you very much, your  _ majesty!”  _

Lunging forward, Noctis grabbed Prom around the middle and hauled him into the bed. “What was that?” he breathed, almost dangerously in the shorter man’s ear. 

He delighted in feeling the blond shiver, “Oh my god,  _ Noct!”  _ he laughed. 

_ That’s better _ , Noctis thought warmly. Prompto didn’t have to use titles with him ever. If anything, Noct should be the one raining such titles on the blond. He was so much  _ better  _ than Noctis in every way. Idly, Noctis began to list through possible pet names for the blond in his arms: Your Radiance? Prompto was as bright as the sun, it might work. Your Grace? No, Prompto deserves far better than  _ your grace. _ He smiles into the blond man’s hair, thinks he will just stick to ‘My Love’ or ‘Babe’, maybe ‘Darling’ if he is feeling particularly sappy. 

“Dude, lemme up, your breakfast is going to burn,” Prompto says, patting his shoulder. 

“Stay,” Noctis pouts into Prom’s neck, tightening his hold. 

He doesn’t realize how weird it is that Prompto concedes to his whining without a fight and falls into his hold with a breathy “Okay”.

Instead he basks in the feeling of having Prompto  _ finally  _ in his arms, like has always wanted. He pauses, why finally? Him and Prompto are married, aren’t they? They are married and happy and Noctis holds him every single day.

Right?

Before he can think too much about it he is being kissed and Noctis forgets about what he was thinking. Prompto crawls more comfortably on top of him and he doesn’t think he has been this happy in a long time. 

The eggs on the stove don’t burn. 

Their day passes by lazily after that. He dozes in and out of sleep with Prompto lazing on his chest, warm and content. They move to the couch and watch movies and play video games together and just  _ exist  _ within the same space. Sometimes Prompto will lean over and give him a casual kiss and Noctis is blown away by how fantastically domestic this all is. 

“Where are Ignis and Gladio?” he wonders, his head in Prompto’s lap. 

“They’re dealing with all your princely duties, it’s just us today,” Prompto says, carding his cool fingers through Noctis’s hair. 

“That’s nice of them,” he comments. 

“Yeah, and I thought it would be fun if we sneak out and go fishing later,” Prompto adds cheekily.

At this, Noctis frowns. “You hate fishing,” he mentions. Prompto, try as he might, couldn’t stand fishing. He explained that he thought it was boring, and that the rewards weren’t worth the waiting. Which Noctis hadn’t really minded, honestly. 

“But… but you like it,” Prompto says, confused. 

“Yeah, but  _ you  _ don’t.” Noctis says, just as confused. They had had this conversation when they were sixteen and Prompto had been terrified that just because he didn’t share the same hobby as Noct that their friendship would be ruined, or something. He never had any expectation for Prom to share every single one of his interests, and he never really asked for Prompto to come with him unless it was a particularly warm summer day and he could sneakily watch a very shirtless Prompto swim nearby while he fished. 

He enjoys fishing and he knows Prompto doesn’t really mind lounging close by but right now he wants them to do something  _ together.  _ “How about we do something we both want to do. What do you wanna do, Prom?” he wonders, smiling up at the blond. 

Prompto stiffens up at his suggestion. “Uh…” he says and Noctis laughs, sitting up to properly look at the other man. He looks perfect. His fluffy hair falling in just the right way across his face, his skin completely clear, and his eyes oh so big. Unthinking, he runs his hand affectionately through Prom’s hair as the other boy still struggles with deciding what to do. His hair falls back into the exact way it was. 

“Fishing?” Prompto tries, a nervous sort of panic in his voice. 

Noctis stares at him incredulously, if he really wanted to go fishing Noctis wouldn’t mind but there is something… off about everything in this situation. 

Something in his head screams that all of this is wrong. He feels a distinct sense of discomfort. Everything in this room is perfect and that is the problem. Even Prompto looks perfect but Noctis loves Prompto every single way that he is and there is something just so  _ off  _ and he can’t explain it and he must be going crazy. He really needs some to breathe some fresh air. 

“I think I’m gonna go for a walk,” Noctis decides, standing up. Suddenly, Prom practically leaps across the room and grabs his wrist.

“No!” the blond says desperately, trying to tug him back. 

“Dude, why not?” Noctis wonders, incredulous. 

Prompto flounders, “Uhhh…” 

Rolling his eyes, Noct turns back around to the door. “Dude, I just need some air, I’ll be right back.” he tugs his arm out of the other man’s hold and opens the door despite Prompto’s shout. 

There is a wall of white outside the door, nothing is around them. 

“What…” Noct stumbles back.

“You were fighting to get out of the crystal.” Prompto whispers, sounding small and the dark haired man whips around to stare at the blonde who hunches into himself nervously. “The… the astrals thought it best to put you into a… dream of sorts. It has been hard to keep you unaware, however your subconscious is always fighting it. They found that if they put… Prompto into your dreams that it would take you far longer to realize what is going on.” the blond explained desperately.

“So none of - of this is real?”

“ _ This”  _ fake Prompto gestures to the world around them “Is your deepest desire. I am just a manifestation of that dream. I am not Prompto. I am a… a screenshot, taken from your memories of him.” 

“I need to wake up,” Noctis whispers dangerously, he feels sick. 

Not-Prompto looks very sad, “You are not ready yet--” 

“The hell with that! The world is in darkness and my friends could be dying and here I am just -- daydreaming!” Noctis snarls, grabbing the fake Prompto by the collar of his shirt and hauling him closer. “How long have I been asleep?” he demands.

“Nine years.” the blond says and Noctis shoves them away in horror, a hand to his mouth.  _ Nine years?  _ Oh gods… 

“Noctis?” Fake Prompto hedges carefully. 

But Noctis isn’t listening. He releases his magic power in a shockwave, the fake Prompto disappears. Another shockwave and glowing white cracks begin to appear along the walls and ceiling of the room. One more shockwave and they get bigger. He attacks the world around him with pure magic, his only goal is to get the fuck out of this stupid  _ rock _ . The cracks become bigger and bigger and his cage keeping him in is becoming thinner. He doesn’t know how but he knows that he is nearly out. Just one more...

But then something in the barrier around him hardens and resists and Noctis stumbles back as fatigue begins to weigh him down. No… no no no  _ NO!  _ He fights it, raising a hand to send out another magic attack but his eyes become unbearably heavy and he falls to the ground. 

The world fades to black around him. 

“Noctis,” a voice calls out to him, poking his cheek. He grumbles, rolling away. 

“Noct, it’s time to wake up! I made breakfast!”

He smiles, and cracks an eye open, “You can’t cook for shit,” he tells Prompto and he doesn’t notice the wrongness of the world around him. 

He never does.

* * *

Prompto does not sleep often, but when he does he dreams. He dreams of a soft light shining in the night, swaying enticingly in the darkness that surrounds him. His nightlight is warm and loving and all-encompassing and is the reason the demon looks forward to curling up and letting his mind fade away. 

Sometimes he will try and catch it, but the warm light will zip away from him almost playfully, enticing him to follow it through the darkness. He gets the sense it is trying to lead him out of the shadows but he is very deep in the dark and it is a long way to get out. Prompto doesn’t mind the journey, his nightlight is good company, if a bit quiet. 

He always wakes up before they reach their final destination, which is annoying. But he always gets to see the light whenever he goes back to sleep, so it isn’t all bad. 

A long time has passed since he has seen light outside of his dreams. The distant lights he sees in the people cities doesn’t count, that light is cold and unalive. And the stars that still shine in the dark sky is a lonely sort of light that Prompto doesn’t like to linger on either. 

The time has passed slowly and yet at the same time agonizingly slow in the way that repetition only brings out. He does the same thing every day, hunt demons and consume them, then hunt even more demons. 

Today his hunt leads him to an abandoned people city. This one is the biggest he has ever seen! With towering skyscrapers that make him seem small and the streets spread out in front of him like a never-ending labyrinth. There are no lights in this city, there are no people here either. Just demons skittering around the ruins and it feels unbelievably empty. 

He does not know it, but this place was once his home.

Prompto’s gaze flickers around the ruins of Insomnia, stepping over rubble and debris. He doesn’t remember this place, not really. But something about seeing the city in decimations makes him unbelievably sad and there is a pull in his tummy that he was once able to recognize as homesickness. Not anymore, though. Now it is just unpleasant and all he knows is that he does not like it. He glares down at his stomach as if that will make the twisty-squirmy feeling go away, but it doesn’t.

There is a human skeleton half trapped underneath a large boulder of the ruble, the old tattered clothes that still cling to it are stiff and blood stained. A low sad whine pulls its way out of his throat and Prompto falls to all fours to scent the corpse gingerly, he wants to reach out and touch but something within him fights against the idea. It would be… disrespectful. Bad. If he touched them. He is a demon, he is cursed. He doesn’t want to taint this innocent person with the evil that courses through his veins.

Sighing, the demon stands on all fours and begins maneuvering between abandoned cars and collapsed buildings. Prompto cranes his neck upward to gaze at the looming skyscrapers that stretch over him and disappear into the darkness of the night sky. He can’t see the stars today, the sky is covered in thick storm clouds that roil and churn angrily. 

There’s going to be a storm. 

But storms are one of the few things he has never been scared of, so he continues exploring this new and yet very old place. He hasn’t been to this place in a very very long time and it feels… familiar. He unconsciously makes his way through the city, leisurely walking and pausing to sniff and investigate certain buildings and places that pique his interests, until he comes to a stop at a house. 

Cocking his head, the demon gingerly makes his way to the door. He doesn’t know how to open it. Grumbling, the demon backs up a step and kicks the door off its hinges with a clawed foot, the cracking sound of the wood echoing on the eerily quiet street. The blond creature silently steps around the door that hangs off the doorframe and into the home, scenting the air curiously. 

Why this house? Out of the thousands that he passed on the way here, why this one in particular? Humming curiously, Prompto wanders through the living room. Raising a clawed hand to lightly touch one of the pictures on the wall of a couple and a small blond boy between them.  _ Family.  _ The voice growls in his head. 

Prompto continues on into the kitchen, rummaging around the cabinets curiously and sending plates and pots slamming into the linoleum floor, making him jump and sprint out of the kitchen. Peaking around the corner, none of the things that had fallen from the little compartments had broken thankfully, Prompto makes a small grumbling noise and continues on his exploration. 

He crawls up the stairs on all fours and kicks down the first door that he sees, hopping inside. This room has a small bed and desk, with various posters and an entire wall with pictures pinned to it. The demon crawls over to the wall and stares at the pictures. He can’t really… understand them, even though he sees them. Of course, he sees that there are a bunch of images of cats and people and places, he quickly bores of it and decides to go see another room only to stiffen at movement in the corner. 

Growling, Prompto pounces towards the movement. Another demon stands in front of him, with blond hair and a glowing arm. Growling, Prompto bares his teeth and the other demon does the same. Absolutely  _ affronted,  _ the demon flares his glowing arm threateningly and raises his talons up. The other demon mimics him. How  _ dare- _

It is then that he notices that the entire room behind him is also behind the other demon. Which is weird because he  _ knows  _ that there isn’t more room where the demon is. There is just a wall. Frowning, he quickly steps away to try and see what is around the stranger but then the demon disappears. Is it a window then? 

Stepping back in front of it, Prompto gingerly raises his claws and scrapes them gently along the window, is the other demon… him? He moves his other hand and the other immediately copies him. A reflection. 

Immediately at ease, Prompto looks at himself and feels his stomach roil uncomfortably. He looks… wrong. He does not know how he should look like but this is  _ not  _ it. He shakily raises his flesh hand and gropes around his horns, tugging on them with growing panic that he does not understand. He looks like a  _ monster.  _

Whimpering, the demon stumbles back, tripping over his own tail and falling to the floor. He can’t take his eyes off himself and he scrambles on all fours and runs out of the house. Falling into a roll on the sidewalk outside of it, panting hard. He scrambles to his feet and bolts down the street, not looking back.

His head  _ hurts.  _ Digging his see-through talons into his hair, Prompto bares his teeth at nothing. It hurts so bad and he doesn’t know why. Shakily, he kneels down in the middle of the street, cradling his head. 

He is a monster. A… a demon. He looks so  _ scary  _ and  _ wrong  _ and Prompto’s migraine triples in intensity and he howls to the rumbling sky. He hadn’t really thought about it before, what he was. But now that he has seen it he is repulsed by his own body. It is so deeply wrong and unsettling and yet he doesn’t know what it is  _ supposed  _ to be. 

He grips one of the many horns that peek out from his hair tight and tug on it with all of his strength, crying out at the pain he himself is inflicting on himself. His red eyes water with unshed tears and after a long moment of trying to rip his own horn from his head, he gives up with a cry of frustration and slams his glowing talons into the street, a crater forming from the hit. 

He sits there for a long time. Eventually, the pain in his head goes away but the maelstrom of emotions do not and Prompto wants to curl up and not move for a week but here is not a good place to do that so he has to get up and find a good place. Grumbling, Prompto begins to crawl towards what was once the Citadel. 

He does not know why he wants to go this way but images flash briefly in his head of an apartment with good food and warmth and companionship and the sound of a laugh that makes him feel warm and happy. Maybe he can find the owner of that laugh this way? That would be nice. 

And so he goes. Stopping a few times to consume demons with more viciousness than usual, like the fact that the monsters are  _ here is _ a personal offense to him. Which it is. This is his home, after all. 

The demon stiffens as he hears the whisper of rubble shifting ever so slightly and his head snaps to the side, gaze narrowing as a dark silhouette walks down the dim street. Backing up a step, a part of him wants to flee but the other part knows that now that he has been spotted he won’t be able to run. 

He knows who this man is. This is the only thing he knows about his life Before. This man is the embodiment of the pain and loss and agony Prompto feels every single day. He could never forget. 

“It is a pleasure to see you again, Prompto,” Ardyn says with a flourish. The blond demon flashed his teeth, tail lashing back and forth as he crouched low. 

Ardyn casually walks perpendicular to the crouched demon, watching him from the corner of his eye, “Might I say you are looking  _ wonderful,  _ my dear. I could have never imagined you would turn into such a fine demon.” 

The blond narrowed his eyes, eyes flashing from violet to red. He did not truly understand what the Chancellor was saying but just the sound of the man’s voice made something within him burn and rage and yet shrivel up at the same time. 

“I wonder what Noct would think if he saw you… think he would try and kill you? You are a demon after all…” 

Prompto snarled, in a flash, he is in Ardyn’s face and raking his claws through the air. The chancellor flings himself backwards, a piece of his cloak gets snagged in the demon’s claws. He grins with razor-sharp teeth and follows after the man before he has time to gather himself, reaching out with his spectral claw this time and a vicious swell of satisfaction fills him as the tip of his talons brush against Ardyn’s flesh. 

The man practically  _ snarls _ , his boot slamming into Prompto’s midsection and sending him flying into a nearby building. He rolls to a stop in a pile of shattered glass and debris, lifting his head to glare with glowing eyes. 

Ardyn cocks his head to the side lazily, glancing down at the tiny scratch on his forearm that has already stopped bleeding black blood “You’ll have to do better than that, Prompto,” he says. Again with that name: Prompto. It means nothing to him but obviously, Ardyn is speaking to him. 

Growling, Prompto launches out of the building and clashes with Ardyn once again. The man nonchalantly dodges his attacks with an unnecessary swagger that burns Prompto’s blood. Suddenly, Ardyn grabs a hold of one of his horns, and knees him several times in the chest and pushing all of the air out of his lungs as he falls to the ground, gasping for breath. 

Ardyn summons a blade from the air, and brings it down in a vicious swoop, Prompto barely raising his blue talons up in time to create a glowing blue shield between them, the sword sparking against the magic barrier and creating a flash of blinding light. It is enough of a distraction for the demon to scramble up and put some distance between them, still trying to get his wind back. 

“It seems you have learned a few tricks,” Ardyn comments, swinging his sword casually. “Very impressive indeed.” 

They clash again and again; Ardyn is faster and more experienced but Prompto rage-filled attacks and dogged pursuit give him no time to breathe and after several minutes the demon manages to get a solid blow across the Chancellor’s chest. Three black oozing claw marks cut through the embroidered fabric of his top piece and Prompto grins up at the surprised man.

Hours trickle on like that, Prompto is practically covered in his black blood, panting hard. He is littered with several scratches and slices that slowly try and stitch themselves back together. His healing is nowhere close to Ardyn’s and his opponent looks barely worse for wear. It pisses him off. 

It seems Ardyn has long since tired of this game and comes at him with vicious annoyance, the blond is barely managing to dodge and falls to the ground in a spin to slam his tail into the man’s side and sends him flying, skidding across the street. He doesn’t let him breathe, throwing out his glowing blue arm to grip the man across the street and drag him back to the demon so that he can rain blow after blow on him before he recovers and sends Prompto flying off himself. 

Ardyn sends his sword back into the armiger, accumulating a thunder spell in his hands to lob at the blond, who barely manages to dodge and watches in equal parts horror and amazement as the glowing ball of pure dark magic flies passed him and into the bottom-most floor of a skyscraper. There is a moment of silence before the spell explodes in a crack of thunder and the building shudders a moment before there is a distinct crack and the building lets out an ear-splitting groan as the supports begin to collapse one after the other and it begins to lean to the side. 

He looks up at the looming building, taking a couple steps back at another loud groan of concrete and rebar snapping. The building begins to collapse somewhere in the middle and Prompto wastes no time to turn and  _ run.  _ Ardyn has already warped to safety, Prompto’s demon eyes immediately lock on where he lounges far down the road, swinging his sword with a smirk. Growling, Prompto runs after him, halfway there there is a shockwave of smoke that nearly knocks him off his feet but he manages to keep his balance and continues charging after the chancellor. He eventually catches up to him, bursting out of the smoke, and manages to catch Ardyn’s arm in his talons. 

His attacks are relentless and overpowering, he attacks low and fast like an animal and doesn’t ever give Ardyn a moment to gather himself. The battle goes on for hours and hours, time blurs and there is nothing but the back and forth of their bloody dance. Several more skyscrapers collapse under the intensity of their fight and Ardyn is getting angrier at how long this is taking. But Prompto has spent over a decade consuming demons and all of that power is being used to try and take this  _ monster  _ down. He is not such easy prey. 

Their fight has moved towards the center of the city and they are both bone-weary and bloody. Prompto is up close in Ardyn’s space, trying to get at him from under his swings when he raises his flesh hand to the side and feels that strange magic connection in his chest and  _ pulls.  _ There is a tugging sensation in his arm and then he is holding a sword, pulled straight from the armiger. Ardyn has no time to react as he stabs him through with the royal weapon. The dark blade sticking through the center of his back. Ardyn gasps, starscourge leaking out of his mouth. 

Prompto tackles him to the ground, sinking his talons into the man’s flesh to keep him  _ still.  _ Already, he can see that he is healing from the stab wound, even with the sword still in his body. He can hurt Ardyn as much as he wants, but he is not the one meant to kill this man so he will always heal from it. An idea strikes him then, Ardyn cannot heal if there is nothing left to heal. He can destroy this monster so thoroughly that there is nothing of him left.

He locks eyes with the Chancellor and  _ grins.  _ Raising his glowing blue hand above Ardyn’s chest he flexes his talons and begins to rip the starscourge out of the man. It was like trying to empty a lake with a cup, no matter how much ichor Prompto ripped out of the man’s body there was always so much more left. 

Snarling, he sunk his claws deep into Ardyn’s flesh. He wouldn’t be able to regenerate if Prompto ate him whole. He would consume him, rip his head from his shoulders, and rend him from shoulder to hip. There would be nothing left of Ardyn Izunia by the end and excitement bubbled in his tummy at just the thought. 

Ardyn stares in something gleefully approaching horror at the ball of leaking black plasmodium between Prompto’s claws. He struggles weakly, writhing underneath the demon as he tries to push him off. No matter how much he struggles, the blond is locked on like a leach. Ardyn would need to rip off his own arm to get Prompto off him. How ironic would that be? 

This is taking far too long, Prompto realizes grumpy. He will need to speed up the process. With a sadistic grin, the demon raised a glowing blue talon and prepared to sink it deep within the red head’s throat. And in that moment Ardyn looked  _ scared.  _ Prompto took an insurmountable amount of glee from this, he wanted to relish in this moment. But the burning need to rid the chancellor’s head from his body was stronger still. 

But just as Prompto prepared to strike, suddenly instead of Ardyn underneath him it was another human, dark-haired and achingly familiar. Stiffening, the demon let out a small confused noise as his raised arm lowered slightly. Cocking his head to the side as he made a tiny questioning noise. 

Ardyn takes full advantage of the minuscule loosening of his hold and swiftly kicks Prompto away so hard he flies across the street and crashes through the nearest building, slamming through several walls before falling through the glass windows on the other side and slamming into a car and lands curled up on his side in the rubble with a whimper. 

He hears Ardyn stalk towards him, the footfalls of his boots seem to echo in the empty street. He comes to a stop in front of Prompto and picks him up by the throat, holding him aloft, his limp tail barely brushing the ground. 

“Looks like you lost, my dear.” Ardyn says, with black stained teeth. Prompto stares at him with drooping red eyes, exhausted. The last thing he hears before fading into unconsciousness is Ardyn’s laughter. 

Across the sea, the King of Light wakes from his ten-year long sleep. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So sorry for the cliff hanger y'all! Hope you guys like it tho! I'm thinking there's gonna be about two more chapters after this? Yeah  
> So I don't really remember the end of the game that well and I'm too lazy to look it up so hopefully I'll do okay lol I was thinking that if Ardyn hadn't tricked Prompto at the end there he would have lost and basically that's how powerful demon Prom is so... yeah lol... he still lost tho. Poor boy. :( I'm so mean to him lol  
> So I hope y'all liked it! I wrote like half of this while drunk after thanksgiving cause apparently I write fanfiction after drinking all night with my family and I went back over everything to make sure nothing was weird but I probably missed some stuff lol


	4. Chapter 4

Noctis steps onto the decrepit dock of Galdin Quay with a sinking feeling in his gut. At his side, Umbra trotted down the rotting wood, jumping over a gap and turning to wait for the king. Noct followed silently, cradling the hand with the ring on his middle finger close to his chest as he tried to fight off the need to vomit. 

The quay looked so different from what he remembered. The dock nearly all but rotting away, enough for Noct to walk gingerly along it for fear of it collapsing underneath his feet. The stench of mold and rot in the air as he entered the hotel connected to the dock made his lip curl, and the low-level demons lingering around he dealt with vengeful prejudice. 

When he stepped off the quay and into the sand, that sick feeling in his gut increased tenfold at the utter  _ infestation  _ of demons skittering around the beach and hills of his  _ home.  _ Snarling, he slaughtered every single dark creature he could see. He couldn’t help but notice how… easy it was. Defeating a pack of goblins -- while before was never really difficult -- now it was as easy as breathing. Easier, even, given the fact that the churning guilt and nausea in his stomach made it difficult to get air in his lungs. 

Ten years. It has been ten years and while he was off taking a  _ fucking nap  _ his home was reduced to this hell. Snarling, Noctis set off a fire spell at a arachne that had been trying to sneak up behind him. The spider demon writhing as it caught flame, the fire fueled by his anger and reducing the scourged demon to a pile of slithering black goo that corroded the grass. Turning his back, Noctis made his way towards the road. Practically stalking up the hill with the air around him wavering with the raw power of his magic energy radiating off of him. 

He can’t believe he let this happen. The entire world was cast in darkness and overrun by demons because he was foolish enough to fall for Ardyn’s tricks. How many people had died? Thousands?  _ Millions?  _ He felt like he was about to collapse under the weight of his failure. He failed everyone and everything on this planet, but hopefully he could fix it. 

Gods, he hoped he could. 

He reached the main highway, and a part of him wanted to turn left towards Insomnia. No doubt Ardyn would be waiting for him there. But the thought of going alone was absolutely  _ terrifying.  _ He isn’t sure he would be able to do it alone. And even if he could, he didn’t  _ want  _ to. So, he walks backwards a couple of steps away from home and turns his back to head right, towards Hammerhead. 

He is only walking for a couple of minutes when he turns and sees the bright lights of a car driving down the road, it is downright out of place in the darkness, and Noctis comes to a stop and waits with equal parts curiosity and nervousness. The car pulls to a stop and a young man rolls down his window and it is Talcott and he is almost as old as Noctis was when they had met and the reality of  _ just  _ how long had passed truly hit home for him. 

It is a sickening thought. The world has really continued to move on without him and there is a bitter selfish anger in his gut at that. He has missed out on so much, on a third of his life, sleeping in a  _ fucking rock.  _ He knows he looks different, he looks older and he has stubble across his chin that he had never before been able to grow -- he had caught a reflection of himself in the side mirror of the car and by the astrals he looks just like his  _ father  _ \-- but he doesn’t  _ feel  _ older. He feels the same as he had. A stupid young kid who is in way over his head. He would never shy away from his destined duty but… he supposed it would be nice to have lived his life without all of this loss and pain. 

Sighing, Noctis watches the scenery go by from his spot in the passenger seat of Talcott’s car, idly hearing him on the phone with someone but too focused on the various demons that he could see stalking around in the shadows. The man beside him tries to start a conversation with him but Noctis’s heart isn’t really in it and they relapse into silence.

They reach Hammerhead and Noctis hops out of the car, his boots crunching against the gravel. The small garage and gas station that he remembers has now become a small community, with a tall fence perimeter and nearly blinding lights shining to keep the demons at bay. He looks around curiously, taking in the sight of people milling around. His citizens look hardier, many have scars and old injuries, and the few children he can see play quietly as if there is a constant threat looming near. It makes something sharp pang in his chest. 

As he looks around his eyes lock on two familiar figures and the relief at seeing his two retainers is nearly enough for his legs to give out from underneath him. They’re  _ alive!  _ He hadn’t allowed himself to think about Ignis or Gladio, if something had happened to either of them he doesn’t know what he would do. He wouldn’t be able to handle it. 

He approaches them, feeling awkward. Gods, what does he even  _ say?  _ It has been so long and he doesn’t think a simple  _ hey guys, how’s it going  _ would suffice. 

“Hey, princess, who knew you could grow a beard?” Gladio ribbed, breaking the silence, and Noctis couldn’t help but smile. A strange relief relaxing his shoulders at his shield’s casual greeting after so long. They are older and so much has happened and yet nothing has changed in the way that mattered. 

“Better than yours,” he told his shield with a gentle smile and Gladio snorted before pulling him into a tight embrace. Noct went limp into the hold, missing the feeling of his friend’s strong arms practically crushing his ribs. He did not complain though, he would gladly be crushed by Gladio if it meant he could embrace his shield just a moment longer. Finally, his shield released him and Noct swallowed the disappointment and instead turned to Ignis who was waiting nearby. 

“Hey, specs,” Noctis said, stepping closer. 

“It is… good to see you, Noctis,” Ignis said, his sightless eyes seeming to bore into Noct’s soul. The dark-haired man couldn’t hold back and practically lunged at the blond and held him tight, inhaling his familiar scent and fighting back the painful lump in his throat. Ignis held him close and Noctis really did cry a little bit. He would deny it if anyone asked though. 

“Prom?” Noctis whispered, still holding onto that faint hope that  _ maybe  _ Ardyn was lying and that his dear friend managed to be found even after he was forced into the crystal. 

Ignis gave him a pained look and the king bowed his head with a grimace, “I am truly sorry, Noctis,” his advisor whispered, placing a hand on his shoulder. 

“We looked everywhere for him, afterward,” Gladio added grimly, and Noctis physically felt his heart shatter. His two retainers shared a meaningful look over his head, “We did find… something, though.”

“What?” Noctis asked, his head snapping up. 

“C’mon,” Gladio says, turning towards the caravan the two of them had been staying in. Noctis sticks close, eager to see what his shield is talking about. 

The large man steps into the trailer and Noctis is hot on his heels, Ignis close behind. He steps up the metal steps and into the caravan, looking around. Like everything else, the inside of the caravan at Hammerhead is familiar and yet oh so different. It is more run-down than he remembers, and now the counter space is covered in various weapons, spells, and books. 

Gladio steps into the bedroom and rummages around in a box under one of the bunk beds crammed in there. He finds whatever he is looking for and turns and presents it to Noct. The king feels his breath leave his lungs. 

Prompto’s camera. 

“We found it in a… cell, of sorts,” Gladio explained weakly as Noctis shakily took the camera. He held it as if it were a baby bird, oh so fragile and easily broken. Even if he knew that Prompto had dropped this thing off literal cliffs and it had been fine. 

Gingerly, he turns it over and turns it on. It comes to life slowly and the view screen brightens to life. He presses the gallery button and he backs up to sit on the couch for fear of his knees giving out. The first picture saved is a selfie of younger Prom and Noctis and Prompto is grinning broadly while Noct gives the camera a reserved smile. He chokes on a sob and covers a hand over his mouth, the image blurs and Noctis quickly swipes it away so he can see the only thing he has left of Prompto clearly. Gladio and Ignis sit on either side of him and he soaks in the comfort they offer greedily, leaning into Ignis and closing his eyes tight. 

Gods, Prompto never should have come with him. He never should’ve been in a situation where he could’ve been hurt and Noctis thinks that it is all his fault. He had begged for Prom to become one of his retainers. Stubbornly ignored everyone warning him about the dangers and only thinking how much fun it would be to go on a road trip with his very best friend. And then… and then everything had gone to shit and Ardyn tricked him and he had  _ pushed Prompto off the fucking train.  _

His breath seizes as the memory of Prompto’s confusion and  _ hurt  _ expression as he falls backwards and off the train and landing in a painful crumple at the side of the tracks plays in his head on loop. Ardyn might have tricked him but ultimately it was Noctis who all but sentenced his friend to death. 

He sobs into Ignis’s chest and Gladio is there too and they embrace him and don’t say a word. It doesn’t lessen the pain and guilt but their strong arms around him keep him from falling apart at the seams and Noctis burrows his face into his advisor's shoulder. He feels almost like a child, the way he is crying and so obviously seeking comfort but neither of his friends say a word and he allows himself this one thing. He cries for a long time and afterwards he is left tired and dry-eyed, and all three of them lay on the couch and fall asleep next to each other.

The next morning they leave early, at least Noctis assumes so because there is no way to truly tell. The drive to Insomnia is quiet, but in a comforting way and once they get to the gates of his home there is a determined resolve between all three of them and they step out of the car and face the city.

Noctis looked at his two retainers on either side of him, both of them looked grim and determined. “Ready?” he asked them.

“As we will ever be,” Ignis said, almost casually. 

“Alright… alright.” Noct said, taking a deep breath before stepping into Insomnia. He doesn’t think he would’ve been able to without his retainers at his back. Their comforting presence gave him strength to move forward despite everything that he lost and Noctis is so thankful to them and doesn’t think he will ever be able to express it. 

That sinking feeling can’t be kept away long though as they walk through the destruction of his home. “Holy shit,” Gladio says grimly, and Noct is inclined to agree.

They are making their way through the city proper and have fought through a couple packs of demons when something pings his attention. He looks around with a frown, “Do you guys… hear something?” he wonders.

“Look up,” Ignis said.

Noctis glanced at the taller man a moment before doing as he was told. His eyes widened as he caught sight of a human figure far above them, hanging from spiked black chains between two skyscrapers and dangling in mid-air. 

“What…” He started to say when thunder rolled and the sky lit up with energy and a flash of lightning struck the chain, he stiffened at the distant scream of the demon above them and made an aborted movement closer. 

“Noct, that's a demon. We do not have time for this,” Gladio said with a large hand on his shoulder. 

The king looked back at his shield, a furrow in his brow, “Why would Ardyn… hang up a demon like that? What purpose does that serve?'' The demon was strewn up like a waiting gift for them, for Noctis. He doesn’t understand the significance of this particular starscourged beast, from what he can see from so far below it doesn’t look familiar at all. 

“I find it best to try and not empathize with the Chancellor,” Ignis piped up grimly.

“Right…” Noct agreed, looking back up at the limp shadow a moment longer before following his retainers down the road and towards the citadel. 

“Geez, someone really made a mess of this place, huh?” Gladio mentioned as Noct helped Ignis over a pile of rubble. 

“I imagine most of the carnage occurred during the initial attack on Insomnia,” the blind man next to him said, primly jumping down off of a ledge of rebar and concrete and onto a half-buried car. 

“Yeah, but this looks… new, like it happened a couple days ago,” Gladio grumbled, walking around a busted water pipe still spewing water. 

“Mayhaps Ardyn had a tantrum,” Ignis called over his shoulder, Noctis snickered. 

“How are we even going to start to fix this?” Noctis grimaces at the collapsed street that revealed the underground subway system, flooded with brackish water. Everywhere he looked there was destruction. They passed several blocks of burnt husks of buildings from a wildfire that must’ve caught years ago a while back; Noctis had tried not to cry at the sight of his and Prompto’s favorite arcade burnt into an empty shell of what it once was. 

“One thing at a time, highness.” Ignis admonished kindly, and Noctis gets the feeling that his advisor isn’t just talking about the city. 

From there the journey is mostly silent, they run into a few packs of demons that they swiftly take out but otherwise they try their best to avoid confrontation. With each destroyed home and decade-old corpses of  _ his  _ citizens they pass Noctiis’s rage swells until he is practically shaking with it.

Noctis has never really hated anyone before. It took so much energy to hate and when the prince was young he would rather spend that energy on something else -- like sleeping. But in that moment Noctis  _ hated.  _ He hated so fiercely and so passionately he felt like he might choke on it. Ardyn…  _ fucking Ardyn  _ had taken  _ everything  _ from him. His home, his people, his happiness, his  _ fucking  _ Prompto. 

Noctis was going to kill him. Slowly, and painfully like he had killed Prom and he was going to make the chancellor  _ scream.  _ He was going to make him beg for death and Noctis wouldn’t give it to him until he was even more fucking crazy from the agony than he already was. He had to fight the manic grin that pulled at his lips at the thought. 

The fight with Ifrit leaves him with burns on his arms and back that not even an elixir can fully heal. Gladio is worse for wear and walks stiffly up the steps of the citadel at Noct’s side, Ignis on his other. If they were in any other situation the king would offer to take a break, but with the knowledge that Ardyn is just an elevator ride away, he is agitated and unable to keep still. He is practically shaking with his anger.

The elevator ride up feels agonizingly slow and Noctis feels the void of emptiness at his side where Prompto usually was like a lost limb. He reaches out to his two remaining retainers and grasps each of their hands tight. He doesn’t know what will happen, but he knows that they will do it together. 

Ardyn is waiting for them on the throne, with all of his loved ones hanging from the ceiling like some sick puppeteer show. All but one, he notices morbidly. Prompto isn’t up there, which he is oddly thankful for. 

The sight of his father and Luna hanging limply makes a magic spark between his hands and when both Ignis and Gladio collapse on either side of him Noctis  _ snaps.  _ He is so fucking done with this shit. He feels like he is going insane with the anger and hate that burns his heart. He is shaking so hard and Ardyn is laughing and if it is the last thing he does Noctis is going to  _ kill him.  _

Ardyn flees to the street below and Noctis follows him and their fight truly begins. He is overpowered by the crystal's magic and each time their swords connect it sends a shock wave out that cracks the concrete beneath them. Each step he takes sends out a shockwave of power and the king feels like he could hold the world on his shoulders with how energized he is. 

But of course, Ardyn barely seems to notice his power boost and meets him on equal footing. It’s infuriating. 

As Noctis parries one of the chancellor’s blows, the taller man unexpectedly kicks out and sends the king flying across the street. Noctis grunts as he rolls to a stop, gritting his teeth at the roadburn heating his palms. His engine blade lays several meters away; Ardyn stalks towards him, starscourge staining his teeth as he grins. Glaring, Noct warps to his sword and in a smooth motion rises to his feet and lunges at the chancellor once again. 

The battle drags on, even with the power of the ring the two kings are evenly matched. Ardyn fights like a dancer, with large swings and spinning evasiveness. He warps through the city with ease whenever Noct begins to have the upper hand, leaving Noctis to have to hunt him down and start all over again. Exhaustion weighs him down and his old back wound begins to pang sharply and he limps painfully through the streets of Insomnia. No matter how many potions and elixirs he takes the pain still remains and his sword is beginning to feel very heavy. Because of this, Ardyn gets the upper hand. Noct begins to stumble back as the flurry of blows make his arms shake and the marrow of his bones rattle. 

Suddenly, Ardyn parries his engine blade and sends it flying across the street. Noct is left without a weapon. With a crazed grin, he stabs his sword through Noct’s shoulder, lifting him into the air by his blade. Noctis screams, grabbing the black metal with gritted teeth. 

On the other side of the city, his scream is heard and red eyes snap open. 

“Poor little king,” Ardyn hisses in his face, looking absolutely delighted.  Noctis glares, feet dangling as blood soaks into the fabric of his coat. His blue gaze locks onto his sword that rests several dozen meters behind Ardyn and with gritted teeth, the king reaches for his sword and  _ pulls.  _ His magic sparks to life, and something within his chest is being tugged and he screams as he warps across the battlefield in a cloud of magic particles and nether dust. Landing with a roll, the wind getting knocked out of him, Noctis gasps for air and clutches his bleeding shoulder as Ardyn swiftly follows him. His hair falls into his eyes and he snarls painfully up at his ancestor, desperately trying to gather his wits to pull a potion out of the armiger.

“You can’t run from me, little king. This battle is ov--”

A blue blur suddenly slams into Ardyn from above and Noct squints through the blood in his eyes as a… a  _ demon  _ grabs the chancellor’s coat with a glowing claw, snarls in his face, and throws him down the street to slam into a concrete wall, demolishing it in a cloud of dust. 

Noctis would have laughed if he still wasn’t trying to catch his wind back. 

The interruption gives Noctis the time he needs to break a potion over himself and be flooded with healing magic. The demon snarls at him as he does this, Noct raises his sword, preparing for the thing to attack. 

Only… it doesn’t. It glares at him as if he has somehow mortally offended him but then it turns back to Ardyn who warps out of the debris and seethes with black streaks falling down his face. 

“I should’ve killed you when I had the chance!” Ardyn rages at the blond demon, who crouches low with his own growl. “Always getting in the way -- how about I kill your darling Noctis and force you to  _ eat  _ him and then we go back to Zegnautus,  _ hmm _ ? Chain you back up and rip off your other arm... then your legs, your tail, everything, until there’s  _ nothing  _ of you left!” Noctis has no idea what is going on between the chancellor and this demon, but he feels a sudden urge to put himself between the two, to protect the small blond creature whose aggressive posturing seems to melt away at Ardyn’s rant and begins to shrink into itself, cradling the glowing arm to it’s chest. His flesh arm has a shackle still attached to it, and Noctis' mind goes back to that demon who was strung between two skyscrapers he had seen earlier. 

He doesn’t do that though, instead he engages with Ardyn once again. Ardyn sighs angrily and warps to Noctis and meets him half way in a clang of steel and the shriek of magic scraping against each other. Only when the redhead shoves him away with his black blade the blond demon lunges over Noct and rakes its claws through Ardyn’s arms before the man can regain his footing. And suddenly Noctis and this demon are working together like a unit. 

They weave in and through each other, increasing pressure on Ardyn until he begins to falter. When the chancellor tries to warp away to regain his breath, the demon grabs ahold and tackles him to the ground with a crocodilian hiss. 

Ardyn doesn’t stand a chance. 

Unlocking the full power of the crystal and the silhouettes of past kings rallying behind him is barely even noticed. He defeats the fucking bastard with a final blow to the chest and watches with grim satisfaction as Ardyn’s handsome physique melts away to reveal the monster that he truly was and as the life within him disappears. Ardyn gives out a relieved breath of laughter and he falls to the ground with a muted thud.

Silence.

It is so quiet. The only sound being Noctis’s shaky panting, nothing else. Suddenly, his legs buckle and he falls to his knees in front of the corpse. He wants to scream, or maybe cry, but he just lowers his head and  _ breathes.  _

He doesn’t know how long he sits there, soaking in the fact that he fucking did it. He  _ won.  _ He is sort of waiting for the relief to wash over him but he feels… nothing. This doesn’t feel like it changed anything at all. The emptiness in his chest is still there, the anger hasn’t even subsided a little bit. With glassy eyes, Noctis glances at his dirtied and bloody hand, the ring looks strangely pristine on his battered finger. He wants to rip it off and toss it somewhere; it helped him through this fight but now it feels as if it is siphoning his very soul and the king feels so shaky and weak after fighting so hard.

Then, there is a small curious noise to his right. Noctis blinked blurrily, raising his head to see the demon crouched a few feet from him, its red eyes raking over him. It doesn’t move, and neither does Noctis. They both just -- stare at each other. 

Gravel slides against each other as the creature’s long, thick tail swishes along the ground. His eyes track the movement before flicking up to those strange eyes that seem to switch from violet to crimson. Its hair is long and gold and falls into its pale face and the horns on its head twist out and away like a decrepit crown. Black scales cover the sides of its face and across its nose, sharp canines peak out from underneath its lip. 

Noctis has never seen a beautiful demon before. 

Warily, the king gets to his feet, stumbling a little as his legs threaten to give out from under him, eyes trained on the crouching creature who blinks up at him but otherwise doesn’t move. He should kill it, Noctis knows. It is a  _ demon _ . And just because it isn’t lashing out at that moment doesn’t mean it won’t turn on a dime and attack. But… but it looks so much like  _ him.  _ This is probably just some trick by Ardyn, and he hates the man more for it but he  _ can’t  _ raise his sword against this demon. Literally, the very thought makes him sick.

Instead, the king takes a couple of steps back, lingers a long moment, and turns and limps back towards the citadel. 

It’s time to finish this. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> BOOM next chapter done! A little bit shorter so sorry about that I wanted to add a little bit of Prom's POV at the end there but I thought that this flows a little bit better! I'm thinking there's probably gonna be two or three chapters left so hey! We are almost done kind of lol I hope seeing two chapters in a row of fighting Ardyn wasn't too monotonous I tried to keep it exciting but I am very bad at fight scenes so sorry ;-;  
> Honestly I don't remember the end of the game too well it's been a couple years since I played it all the way through so I didn't even try to be accurate cause I didn't want to look it up cause I'm lazy but I hope for those of you that actually remember what happens it wasn't too distracting!  
> Please tell me what y'all think and I hope you guys liked it and have a great holiday! :)

**Author's Note:**

> Uhh... so yeah i started a new project! I don't think this will be that long, three, maybe four chapters and with a shit ton of angst! Please tell me what you guys think of this idea and what you guys think :P constructive criticism is always welcome ^^


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